The mountain bike race is contested each long weekend in March and its prime focus is to raise funds to keep the Visitor Centre open, says board president Trevor Holcup.

"It's become a matter of survival for the visitor's centre."

Run entirely by volunteers, the event attracts around 500 riders and contributes some 40 per cent of the visitor centre budget,

The race means more to the town than merely money however.

The cup contributes to recognition for Northcliffe, says Trevor. "There's a sense of cutting it on a bigger stage than just this tiny little town on the bottom end of Western Australia."

The first race 15 years ago attracted about 70 entrants. Then with the help of the WA Mountain Bike Association, recalls Trevor, "we cranked it up many notches".

"At the end of that, it made them (the town) feel proud that our little community could put on something as professional as this. That's still the feeling that it generates."

Revenue dried up

Once upon a time, visitor centres were tourist bureaux and government funded them, explains Trevor. Next came the idea that they would become self supporting with the source of their income commissions from accommodation bookings.

"The internet has had a huge impact on visitor centre liability." Add to the centre woes the global economic crisis and the high dollar, says Trevor. Australian travellers go overseas and international tourists stay away. Meanwhile, grey nomad incomes are shrinking.

The Karri Cup has a long term local sponsor but sponsorship money also is drying up in these tougher times, Trevor notes.

Do the visitor centres matter? That's the question Trevor would like the state government to answer.

"We're just bleeding slowly to death and I would like the government to articulate what role it sees for visitor centres. If it doesn't see a role for visitor centres, well that's fine and we can all pack up and save ourselves a lot of anxiety."

"We need first of all for government to decide that they want us."

Visitor centres are encouraged to undertake accreditation to national standards, says Trevor. "But there's no reward through that apart from knowing that you're doing the job properly."

The requirements are stringent and centres must employ paid staff in order to accreditation, but in return, reap "nothing that helps to keep us open".

"I would like to see recurrent funding to the equivalent of one full time staff member for visitor centres that meet proper standards."

Paid staff makes a big difference, says Trevor, in that those staff can be expected to meet the national standards of service. "Volunteers have done us proud, but you can't have those sorts of expectations of volunteers.

"The crux of it is for the government to reward us for the service we provide."

Visitor centres are closing

"Events like the Karri Cup will die," states Trevor. A commercial sponsor might step in, he allows, but at a far greater cost and without the attending social benefits.

The event costs around $200,000 to stage, he estimates. "It runs entirely on volunteer labour."

Visitor centres receive positive response from those who use the service, says Trevor. "We get feedback that says that we are important.

"Obviously, we're not as important as we used to be because a lot of information is available on the internet.

"But web pages go out of date and it's not often easy to find out how up to date they are.

"In our case, a lot of our attractions are to do with what's happening in bush: what flowers are flowering, where to find them, what the sea conditions are like and where the fish are running.

"You don't find that on the net on a daily basis."

Visitors may like the service but they don't want to pay for it, says Trevor wryly. "To quote a fellow centre manager, 'Nobody goes into a visitor centre expecting to spend money.'"

If the Northcliffe Visitor Centre folded, feeling in the town would be split 50/50, Trevor thinks.

But that would change when March came round and there was no Karri Cup, he says. "That central, once a year focus, that put Northcliffe on the map, would cease to exist."

Trevor's confident that without the centre, the Cup wouldn't run: that it wouldn't be commercially viable and that there wouldn't be other groups in town to take it over.

"Maybe some other community organisation would step up and run it but I can't imagine who. Maybe I've got my blinkers on," he jokes.

"I do want a direction from the government. If the visitor centre were to close, it wouldn't have any impact on my business and it would free up a lot more of my time. I don't have vested interest in keeping the visitor centre open."

In some ways, it could be relief if the centre were to fold, says Trevor. "There's an enormous amount of volunteering in this community to keep things going."

The Karri Cup is a challenge for both riders and the community, he says. "It's a challenge and those who take on the full thing are riding 100km on dirt tracks.

"They say that one kilometre on dirt tracks equals two on the road. It's a very testing event."

Riders love the scenery of the race route, says Trevor. "That presents a challenge for the organisers.

"Karri forest is a very dirty forest in the sense that it's always dropping leaves and bark," he laughs. "You've got to work to keep the track clear so riders aren't getting sticks through their spokes."

The Karri Cup trophy is crafted locally from karri, a very hard wood, notes Trevor. "It's a labour of love."

Footnote

Terry Redman, local member and the Minister for Agriculture, has announced that the National Party will commit funds to visitor centres.

In a media release, Mr Redman said, "The Nationals WA, should they win the balance of power at the upcoming election, will inject more than $1 million from Royalties for Regions into Regional Visitor Centres to help them service tourists and local tourism businesses.

"The $1.05 million commitment will be for contestable funding and based on current figures around 35 accredited Regional Visitor Centres would be able to apply."